The Beauty of Bow Ties
by Silver Dragon 475
Summary: It was just another normal day at work for Blaine. Just another dinner party full of old ladies who pinch his cheeks and smell like the enitre perfume department. Another night of serving food, collecting trash, and generally trying to make sure everyone is completely happy at the same time. Easy...Then he walked in.


Hey, I just watched Glee, and it's still Valentine's day so I'm posting this now because it kind of applies. Just something short and sweet I wrote to hopefully get my creative juices flowing once again.

Oh, also kinda based on a true story. Granted there was no Chris Colfer or Darren Criss or Kurt or Blaine (none of which I own by the way), but there was me and a cute boy and phone numbers were exchanged.

Enjoy!

* * *

The old building loomed out of nowhere, it's crumbling stone walls and dim yellow lamp lights casting a sinister façade in the foggy evening. However, the sleek black Maserati with a golden warbler hanging from the rearview mirror was not deterred and swung, without hesitation into the steep driveway, which lead to a cracked parking lot and then down a short dirt road. The building was no less intimidating from the back, but the dark car slid easily into place alongside a silver Ford and a huge white van with a catering logo along each side and a grungy trailer hooked behind it. The tattered screen door rattled in the slight breeze as he passed by shoving his shoulder against the heavy oak door so that it shot open spilling golden light and cheery voices into the cool dark night.

"Blainey!" The scruffy Italian man ruffled the boy's curly hair, laughing at the scowl on his face. "You get shorter every time I see you!" Blaine swiped at his hair and pushed past into the steamy kitchen.

"Hey Tony." He slipped through the swinging door into the smaller ballroom and let the black duffle bag slide from his shoulder onto the empty table. Digging frantically for a moment he discovered what he was searching for. The half-filled bottle of hair gel hung triumphantly from his fingers for a moment before it was brutally snatched away. A sharp gasp escaped from his throat as Antonio danced away popping the cap and dangling the bottle precariously above the trash can.

"No! Tony don't!"

"Aww, come on Blainers."

"Don't call me that!" Tony quirked an eyebrow and the container tipped threateningly.

"No, please. I need that." Tony cast an appraising eye over Blaine's locks.

"Nah, I don't think so." Blaine let out a frustrated grunt fingers tangling in the bothersome curls.

"Enrico!" He called in desperation to the elderly man in a stained apron leaning against the kitchen doorway. "Please control your son!" Enrico just laughed and shook his head. The lock on the main door clicked open and two women stepped through.

"Michaela! Michaela!" He called to the taller one. "Your husband slipped his leash." Antonio's jaw dropped on shock; he was so surprised he forgot to tip the hair gel. Michaela just laughed and the shorter woman rolled her eyes.

"Don't be an ass Tony. I know it's hard, but try." She admonished snatching the hair product. "If Blaine wants to smother his hair in gel that's his choice." Gratefully Blaine accepted the bottle, clutching it to his chest and backing slowly into the bathroom.

When he emerged there was a shiny helmet where there had once been curls. On the bright side however, Blaine was quite a bit happier and the bottle of gel was empty. The ballroom was devoid of people but the kitchen had gained quite a few more occupants including three waitresses and another teenage volunteer, like Blaine. Weaving his way through the rushing people he finally slipped into a calm alcove and gave a brief hug to the short woman, shorter than him at least, who had rescued his hair gel.

"How ya doin Jess?" He questioned, simultaneously pulling his t-shirt over his head and searching back through his bag for the lightly stained tux shirt he always wore to out parties. She waved back at him in acknowledgement with a vague grunt as she rifled through cardboard boxes and plastic storage bins.

Blaine smiled amusedly to himself and pulled out the ruffled dress shirt. He was shrugging it on when a sharp two tone whistle sounded over the bustle in the kitchen.

"Blaine! Lookin good!" He rolled his eyes and finished buttoning before turning to face the grinning girl. Her long auburn hair was pulled up into a high ponytail and her blue eyes sparkled mischievously at him.

"Nice to see you too Sammi." She opened her mouth to say something else when Enrico waddled around the corner.

"Eh! Red! How you doin?" She jerked forward as he smacked her on the back in what was supposed to be a friendly way.

"Hey Enrico." She rolled her eyes exaggeratedly and Blaine stifled a chuckle.

"You have a boyfriend yet Red?" Samantha let out a frustrated sigh and spun around to face the annoying man.

"No, no Enrico, I don't. Why don't you ask Blaine?" The elderly Italian dropped his easy smile and cast a glance over the boy behind Sam before he turned away to a bubbling pot as if it had suddenly become the most fascinating thing in the world. Blaine sighed quietly as the red ponytail whipped around again.

"You know he's fine until you remind him." He admonished gently and she quirked a fine eyebrow.

"No, he's an ass." Blaine scoffed mildly and took a box from Jess before making his way back out to the truck. She followed him even as he slid his load into the back and returned for another.

"Blaine, you know he doesn't ask me that when you're not here. He doesn't care until you're in the room. And he's the only one who does care! Everyone else just doesn't want to upset him. You can't just..."

"Yes! Yes I can! Samantha it's my choice what I want to do. How I want to handle stuff. It is my decision if I don't want to risk upsetting anyone. It's my decision if I want to continue coming here, and if I want to do it without Enrico's eyes burning into my back, and if I want to be able to talk to Burt, and Angela, and..." Sam grabbed his arm and pulled him outside behind trailer so they couldn't be seen from the open door. She wrapped her arms around him and pushed his head onto her shoulder. He breathed harshly for several long moments while she kept up a quiet mantra.

"I'm sorry. I'm so sorry. God Blaine, I'm so, _so_ sorry." He pulled away letting out a long breath and giving her an awkward little smile.

"We'll, that was interesting."

"Yeah." Sam agreed. "And since I've already shoved my foot as deep in my mouth as it can possibly go, I have to ask. Are you alright?" He looked away. "Is everything ok with your dad?" The breath he sucked in through his teeth was shaky and she could almost hear it rattle down to his lungs.

"Not any worse, not any better. He doesn't talk to me." She wrapped him back in her embrace.

"I'm sorry sweetie. For your dad and for what I did. That's the last thing you need right now."

"It's ok, you didn't know, and you're only looking out for me." Samantha nodded.

"We'll, I did know, but I am definitely looking out for my Blainey-wainey." Blaine groaned in protest and dropped his head on her shoulder. "Speaking of which, why I haven't heard about any boys recently. You know I called dibs on threatening all of them with extreme and creative pain if they hurt you."

"Right, as soon as there is a boy I'll let you know and you can threaten away." She nudged his shoulder playfully as they made their way back into the building.

"And don't you forget!" They laughed together and Blaine nudged her back.

"Blaine, get in the truck!" Jess waved from the window and Sam gave him a shove.

"Go on, maybe you'll find your boy there."

"It's a birthday party, in a retirement community." He objected, climbing in the cab and leaning out the window. Samantha walked alongside until Burt pulled off the dirt road. "That means it's all rich old people."

"Old rich people have the best grandkids!" She winked at him and waved as they passed by.

* * *

The ride was thankfully short and relatively quiet with only the sound of the radio announcer and the occasional smart ass comment by Tony and Jess's rebuttal.

Set up was mostly finished by the time they arrived, the people throwing the party wanted to use their own place settings, so Blaine only spent a few minutes arranging salad dressings and butter plates on tables while Jessica organized the buffet. The elderly woman in charge was very nice, despite the fact that she pinched his cheeks and rambled on about her granddaughter. By the time people began arriving Blaine was more than ready.

Jess tapped him on the shouter lightly as the first guests pushed open the heavy door and stepped, eyes wide with awe, into the beautifully decorated clubhouse. She was holding up a piece of black elastic with a hook on each end and a pathetic little pre-tied bow-tie in the center. Blaine winced and pulled a strip of fabric, silk in fact, out of his pocket. He held it up hopefully and Jess just rolled her eyes and nodded. As she stepped away to put the hideous strip of polyester back into a nearby bag, though Blaine felt the trashcan not two feet away would be a more appropriate. Looping his own tie around his neck Blaine let out a nearly silent sigh of relief. He loved bow-ties, in fact he adored them; it was probably an unhealthy obsession and it was one of the many points of contention between himself and his father, but he loved them anyway, and that disgusting thing she had offered him was NOT a bow-tie.

With expert fingers he finished the knot perfectly letting his gaze swing out over the rapidly growing mass of people in the room. The crowd was mostly elderly women in old fashioned suits that probably didn't fit when they were purchased, wearing too much costume jewelry that pulled their earlobes to the ground or was lost in the folds of their necks. And all that was surrounded by a cloud of perfume that made Blaine wish he was asthmatic so he had an excuse to get away.

This was what he loved though, not as much as bow-ties of course, but ever since he'd started volunteering for community service hours at the clubhouse where Enrico's Catering made its home and been asked to help out at a party he'd loved working there. It wasn't that he loved waiting on people, actually sometimes people were downright horrible to "the hired help"; it was the combination of the people he was working with and the fact that he could help something go perfectly for someone else.

Everyone had arrived accept the birthday girl, at least that was what Jess whispered in his ear a few minutes later, and Blaine was starting to get a little antsy. Apparently so was Tony whose phone didn't have service in the tiny kitchen so he couldn't get the latest result on whatever football game he was following that night. Blaine didn't hate football, but he only followed a couple teams and none of them were playing so he stepped away from the quietly cussing man and went back to his people watching, only to have his eyes lock on a single person.

He had just walked through the door, and elegantly dressed older woman on his arm. There was an eruption of sound, but Blaine didn't hear it. He was too busy studying the high swept cheekbones and clear blue-green eyes all topped by perfectly coifed silken chestnut locks. He smiled and kissed the wrinkled cheeks of the women who all but accosted him and his companion but somehow miraculously managed to avoid getting a single cheek pinch.

Jessica's hand on his shoulder and her quiet order to "Wake up Blaine, you're drooling" broke him out of his stupor and made a hot blush spread over his face. He slipped back into the kitchen and missed the curious glance that the beautiful boy sent him.

The first course went well; salads were prepared quickly and perfectly, no one complained, and Blaine managed to completely avoid the table holding the beautiful boy and his grandmother. Jess worked that table and the two directly around it without complaint although she did send him several knowing looks, which he promptly ignored. All in all everything was going well, until entrees started coming out. Tony couldn't keep up and needed Jess in the kitchen to help him prepare dishes and load trays so Blaine was left waiting the entire room on his own...including the beautiful boy's table.

"Ok, you can do this without making a fool of yourself. Really, you can." He tried to convince himself as he balanced the first four plates on his lower arms and palms. Starting from the outer tables was a good excuse to delay what quite literally inevitable, but Jess was very good at her job and there was barely any lag time between the moment Blaine picked up the last two plates and the moment he returned to find the tray once again full.

Blaine knew he was being idiotic, he didn't even know this guy. He probably wasn't even gay, although Blaine highly doubted that a straight guy would be caught dead in the flattering, fabulous, and fashion-forward ensemble he had managed to put together and pull off. It was certainly a far cry from the many bow-ties Blaine experimented with on the rare days when he wasn't buttoned up in Dalton's blazer. Thinking about clothes calmed him a bit and his hands weren't shaking as he approached the table, that isn't to say that they didn't immediately begin shaking, especially when he leaned down between two gossiping women to place a plate and caught a whiff of something that held its own against the overwhelming stench of grandmother and had a distinctly masculine scent. Even more unnerving was that when he lifted his head a pair of deep, clear blue-green-gray eyes was watching him from across the table. Flushing cherry red, Blaine hurried back to the tray jack and steadied himself against the edge of the tray. When he turned back the eyes were no longer watching him, in fact they had been preoccupied with something the woman to his right, his grandmother if Blaine's guess was correct, had said. A high tinkling laugh that matched the happy twinkle in his eye made Blaine pause for a moment and close his eyes in a vain attempt to clear his head and try desperately to force his traitorous hands to stop shaking.

The boy wasn't looking at him as he gently set the plate in front of the elderly woman beside him, but as Blaine began to pull away her aged hand clasped his wrist with a grip that was surprisingly strong for how frail she looked.

"I'm terribly sorry" she said in a clear but quiet voice which immediately grabbed the attention of the teenager next to her. "My grandson, Kurt," she gestured, but Blaine refused to look. _Kurt_. "Doesn't want to make a fuss, sweet boy." Blaine nodded senselessly feeling his own cheeks heat slightly in sympathy for _Kurt_.

"Grandmother!" Kurt hissed and God if his voice wasn't the most beautiful sound in the world. She flapped her other hand at him.

"Hush Kurt. Anyway, he's rather self-conscious about his figure and he won't forgive me if he's forced to eat the delicious mushroom-cream sauce on this chicken, so if it isn't too much trouble would you mind bringing one out without any sauce?" Blaine felt his mouth go dry, both at the mention of Kurt's figure, and at the thought of what he had to say next.

"That shouldn't be a problem ma'am, but if we are not told ahead of time all specialty dishes will be served after the original dishes have all gone out, even for something as simple as that. Is that alright?" Steeling himself he turned to Kurt as he asked hoping that his expression said 'I'll bring you your food if you want it' and not 'Christ you're gorgeous' like he was thinking. Kurt stared, lush pink lips slightly parted, from Blaine to his grandmother and back again before finally acquiescing with a short, still confused, nod. His grandmother released Blaine's arm and smiled widely up at him.

"That'll be lovely dear, thank you so much." Blaine nodded and stepped away to gather the full tray from Jedd who was looking down at Kurt's singular dish with a quirked eyebrow. Shaking his head Blaine removed the plate and settled the full tray on the jack as she slid the empty one off and headed back to the kitchen.

It was only. A few minutes before Blaine was placing the final tray on the dirty stack and requesting Kurt's grandmother's 'mutated' dish. Tony greatly disliked his creations being messed with, especially at the last minute like this, but he grudgingly made the new plate and Blaine moved back into the dining room. Kurt was conversing with his back to his grandmother again so Blaine rounded the table on that side, leaning between them with free hand tucked behind his back so as to avoid accidentally brushing the straight back or strong shoulders beside him.

Just as the plate thunked gently onto the tablecloth, drawing Kurt's attention, something yanked Blaine's ankle out from under him forcing him to steady himself on the edge of the table and the back of Kurt's chair, the only things close enough to grab in support. Unfortunately his position meant that when Kurt turned to thank him their noses all but brushed and their sharp breaths mingled in the small space between them. For several long moments all they did was breathe gently, completely unaware that the world continued turning around them. Then Blaine realized exactly what he was doing and, turning an oddly attractive rose color, all but ran back to the kitchen. Kurt sadly watched him go, though the view was almost worth the fact that he was leaving, and turned to his grandmother; lips still parted as if to speak.

She gave him an innocent grandmother look which didn't fool him for a second. He glanced down at the cane at her left hand, leaning oh so innocently against the wrong side of her chair.

"Grandmother," she made a quiet 'hmm?' noise, "what are you doing?" She laughed lightly.

"Oh Kurt, sweetheart, did you really think I didn't see the look you gave him? You haven't taken your eyes off him since he walked in the room. Teenagers," she scoffed to the woman on her other side, "they think they're so subtle." The entire table giggled like school girls and Kurt flushed a brilliant red as his mouth hung open in shock. He refused to speak to those gossiping old hens for the rest of the night. However his eyes remained firmly fixed on the doorway to the kitchen.

Blaine couldn't breathe, he couldn't fucking breathe! His fingers tangled in the perfectly knotted bow-tie all but ripping it from his neck. The top button of his shirt actually popped from the force and he slammed the strip of silk onto the counter before falling against it himself. Jess's hand on his shoulder wasn't a surprise and neither were her sympathetic eyes and barely concealed bemusement.

"Thanks." He whined not waiting for her comment, at least she had kept Tony away. "As if that wasn't already the most embarrassing moment of my life." She rubbed his back gently.

"Don't worry, there will be plenty more of those." He groaned loudly and she gave him a hearty slap. "Come on, help me clean up the kitchen a little and I'll let you sample desert. Blaine sighed.

"Fine."

A long, oddly shaped strip of black silk lay abandoned on the counter.

Dinner clean up went smoothly, so did desert, mostly because Jess was nice enough to let him avoid Kurt's table. Finally, _finally_, as the last few party-goers were finishing up their Styrofoam cups of ice cream smothered in delicious peach fruit sauce, they were packing up the kitchen and Blaine was wheeling heavy carts of utensils and left-over food into the cool night air and out to the truck. When he returned from making his last trip and it was time to say goodbye, everyone was milling around chatting and he opted against struggling alongside Erin and Burt into that strangling sea of cheek-pinching satin. Instead he waited in the shadows of the kitchen doorway until they returned envelop in hand. The ride back was strangely silent, but if the other occupants of the car did speak, Blaine was stuck too deep inside his thoughts to notice. He was trying so desperately hard not to think of Kurt, that beautiful boy which he could never see again; inevitably the more he tried to avoid the thought of Kurt, the more he couldn't get the boy out of his mind. Not his silky-soft chestnut hair, or his long, delicate fingers, or his gorgeous blue-green...No! Bad Blaine! Stop it!

By the time they made it back to the club whatever dinner party that had happened there was in the middle of the clean-up process and Blaine had almost managed to convince himself that he would never see...you-know-who, again at it was best for all involved that he be forgotten completely. Yup, Blaine wasn't even going to tell Samantha because that would mean remembering and he didn't want to do that at all. No siree.

Not at all.

Kurt stood when his grandmother did and followed her around the room as she chatted, tossing his barely-nibbled desert in a convenient trashcan. It wasn't that the peachy sweet wasn't good, in fact it was delicious, but Kurt was far too busy desperately searching the throng of people for a dark, well-gelled head of hair. His grandmother pulled his arm and dragged I him to her conversation, but he heard nothing, his focus still on the crowd and the kitchen doorway. Finally she released him and he wandered aimlessly around the room before managing to make his way into the...empty kitchen.

They were gone; absolutely gone. There wasn't even a crumb or a dirty dish rag left on the counter. Kurt paced around the tiny space in dismay his hand running over the time-worn countertop until it encountered a crumpled pile of silky fabric. His fingers tangled around it so that it slid out from the shadows.

Kurt, of course recognized what it was immediately though he had absolutely no idea where it could've come from. The elderly men who came to the clubhouse didn't have nimble enough fingers to toe bow ties anymore, neither did most of their wives, and the caterer-lady was wearing one of those horrible pre-tied things, not that he blamed her for that, but where has this come fro... The boy's face flashed in Kurt's mind's eye and mentally his gaze flashed down to the perfectly knotted tie just below his brightly flushing face.

Kurt was at his grandmother's side before he realized he was moving. The elderly women around her stared at him in shock, but she just continued speaking calmly, without a care in the world. Kurt's upbringing forced him to bounce at her side, bow-tie clenched in hand, until she stopped speaking. Except that didn't happen. She continued to speak, and speak, and speak, until it became nothing more than pointless rambling and Kurt was well aware of it.

"Grandmother?" She ignored him but a smile quirked the edge of her lips. Kurt made a frustrated noise and tried again.

"Grandmother?!" This time she waved her hand at him dismissively which caused him to freeze mid bounce a mischievous gleam sparkling in his clear blue eyes.

"Grandma!" He whined his voice pitched even higher than usual. Her companions all but gaped at him. "Listen to me!" She turned ever so slowly and spoke to Kurt with the air of a frustrated parent obliging a spoiled child.

"Yes Kurt?" He held up the strip of silk wrapped around his fist, and waved it about so that the ends flapped frantically.

"Where did he go?" She lifted a wizened eyebrow.

"Who dear?" There was a knowing smirk on her lips, and Kurt's mouth worked helplessly as he realized he didn't even know the boy's name.

"The...um the caterers, where did they go?"

"Oh, I assume back to where they came from." With that she turned back to her staged conversation.

"And where exactly might that be?" Kurt spoke through gritted teeth which only made her grin wider as she responded.

"Well, I think there based out of that little clubhouse just about 20 minutes up the road. The Knights of something or other." Her voice became strangely light and airy and her hands flitted all through her response as if controlled by invisible puppet-masters whose thoughts on how the show should proceed we're completely independent of his grandmother's. Kurt let out his breath in a huff.

"You mean the Knight's of Columbus where Grandfather goes almost daily to speak with the other members and where you attend weekly Sunday breakfasts?"

She gestured emphatically at him and all but shouted, "Yes, that's it!" To which Kurt replied only by shaking his head and directing a pensive gaze to the cloth still clutched in his hand. Withered fingers covered his own and most of the mischief was gone from his grandmother's gaze when he raises his eyes to meet hers.

"Go, Kurt."

He went.

Sam was so involved in the extensive clean-up for the dinner party at the clubhouse that she didn't get a chance to even really say hello until Blaine had done his part of putting away ingredients and silverware and was all but out the door. It was customary to stick around, but he just didn't have the mental or emotional strength for her questions today. One random beautiful boy at one random dinner should not have had this great an effect on him. Nevertheless he had and Blaine needed to go home and figure out exactly what was wrong with him.

He just needed to get in the car and drive away and forget about this while stupid ordeal. It wasn't even really an ordeal. It was just some guy at a party. It was just some random lovely teenager who attended his grandmother's birthday party. It was just some random, beautiful, teenager guy… who was standing in the parking lot.

Blaine froze in the doorway, yellow light spilling onto the ground around him and his heart beating a thousand miles an hour in his chest. Then he saw his bow-tie held gently in one delicate, pale hand and his heart stopped. The boy came closer and closer, but paused uncertainly at the edge of the circle of warm light. Blaine felt a gentle nudge at his shoulder and turned his head slightly so that half of Samantha's face was in his peripheral vision as she whispered in his ear.

"Go on Cinderella, and get your prince." Blaine's steps were hesitant, but he finally made it to the edge of the ring of light and he and Kurt were standing face to face. Silence reigned, and then.

"Hi."

Blaine swallowed and prayed his voice wouldn't crack. "Hi." Kurt held up his forgotten accessory.

"You left this on the counter." Taking it Blaine nodded and draped the strip of fabric around his neck so the thick ends lay flat on his chest.

"Thank you, I would have been devastated when I saw it was gone."

"No problem. Um, I actually have another motive for coming here." Blaine quirked one thick eyebrow. "You may or may not have noticed but my grandmother was attempting to match make in her own little way." He waited for Blaine's nod, which could mean so many things like 'I saw what she was doing' or 'I didn't see it but I understand what you mean' or 'I think you're crazy and I'm going to placate you until I see an opportunity to escape.'

"Anyway, her meddling in my love life aside, I really did think you were cute and I was wondering if you would do me the honor of telling me your name. Oh, wait, how rude of me." He stuck his hand out.

"Kurt, Kurt Hummel." He offered first. Blaine took the proffered hand and it was so soft, and smooth, and so strong. He could die happy at this very moment because the rest of his life would have been spent holding this hand. Wide smiles stretched across their faces.

"I'm Blaine."

* * *

Let me know what you think, or not. I wish everyone a Happy Single's Awareness Day...I mean Valentine's Day, and I hope that if you have yet to see the new Glee episode your period of torture ends soon.

TTFN (Ta-Ta For Now)

Silver Dragon Out


End file.
